starring role
by a sea of sound
Summary: Her father refuses to look after her as she walks past the gates of their mansion, knowing she won't look back. She is too much like her mother to remember him, after all. —yancy-centric, featuring shiningstarshipping.


**i**

She awakens from a nightmare-free sleep, excited and dead-set on the goal she's had for five years.

Yancy rises from her bed in the dreamlike style of the actresses on TV that has become her modus operandi, lightly landing on her toes like a ballerina. She likes to pretend she doesn't notice the way her father lowers his eyes as she enters the kitchen for the most important meal of the day. She knows he doesn't want this, and he shouldn't have to; after all, who wants their daughter to reach the same downfall as her mother? Doctor Rukko decides that no, she's too young and too happy to do that to herself. (But so was her mother, and where is she now, if not six feet under?)

She bounds out the door with her audition forms in one hand and her chauffeur in the other, already a woman on a mission. _As graceful as a Liepard_, they'd said. Her father refuses to look after her as she walks past the gates of their mansion, knowing she won't look back. She is too much like her mother to remember him, after all.

Yancy is ten when she leaves home without forgetting anything.

* * *

**ii**

She's ten when she makes her first friend.

His name is Curtis, and his hair is a very odd pale green color that reminds her of key lime pie; Yancy tried not to stare at the mole on his chin, because she heard her father's soft voice in her head telling her it's rude to stare. Besides, she had cotton-candy pink hair, and who was she to say his appearance was weird? He sat with an older-looking girl who seemed to be about sixteen or seventeen, with the same exact eyes and hair as Curtis. Yancy assumes she's his sister.

They speak amicably and make polite conversation. Perhaps the conversation was too polite for two ten-year-olds, but in show business no one has time for childhood. They discuss their interests and Yancy is surprised that, like her, Curtis sings and hopes to be somewhat of an idol. Yancy argues she wants to be both an actress _and_ a professional singer, not somewhat of anything. What can you do with only a little bit of something? Despite this, she likes Curtis, so she apologizes for her bluntness and insensitivity. Curtis thinks she's old for her age.

Her audition goes well with the people at _ChitChat with Patty Patrat_, and she waits with Curtis for their results. Only six kids would be chosen to star in the children's talk show, and Yancy crosses her fingers in secret that both she and Curtis make it in. She doesn't realize how attached she has grown to be in those long hours until a man dressed in black pants and a black shirt and black everything comes out of the audition room, microphone fixed professionally to his ear.

He recites six names from a list.

Brent Astropoff...

Xena Goldman...

Kyle Harrington...

Mary Hennessy...

Yancy Rukko...

Yancy's breath hitches in her throat, ignoring the ache in her fingers.

Curtis Tenma...

It is as though all of her fears left the world in that moment, as she turns to her friend and sees him beaming beside her. Yancy flings her arms around Curtis, and he laughs and places his heart on his sleeve.

He stops and takes a look at her, pink hair curled at the ends and deep blue eyes shining, and figures that no, she isn't old for her age. She's just too good for him.

* * *

**v**

Yancy is fourteen when she discerns that Curtis is _most likely_ not her soulmate.

She hadn't put any money on it, the careful and pragmatic soul she was, but that doesn't mean she doesn't think about it. Sure, the both of them were young, just entering the world of adolescence. Yet they've worked together since they were ten, and neither Yancy nor Curtis felt the weight of their years. It seemed they knew what they were getting into when they signed up to be child actors, tacitly agreeing that in exchange for their chance to grow up as normal children, they would achieve fame and fortune. Not only that, but Yancy loved dressing up and being photographed and Curtis enjoyed having the chance to be in the spotlight, away from the burdens of familial melodrama.

He simply told her that he didn't feel as though their relationship was going anywhere, but that he wanted to remain friends. Yancy had agreed, because she couldn't lose the boy with the cute mole on his chin and incomplete name. She cares about him too much, but maybe too much just wasn't enough. No, not for Curtis.

She puts on a winning smile as the cameras begin rolling once again, all glittering teeth and artificiality. Curtis avoids her eyes because he knows he is the one who put the tears there.

Doctor Rukko sits in front of a wide television screen broadcasting his daughter as she stares off into another dimension. Her palpable insouciance toward the boy sitting opposite of her across the small glass table does not go unnoticed, and even miles away he can feel Yancy's yearning to disappear.

* * *

**iv**

She believes they began dating when they're twelve, though she's not quite certain of that.

He'd pecked her very lightly on the lips in a rather out of the blue fashion, taking her off-guard and lowering the walls of steel around her heart. She wonders when they got there because she doesn't remember ever building them; she realizes then that other people built those walls, not her. Her eyes remain wide as she feels the crumbled ruins of steel fall somewhere someplace, and she briefly asks herself who is going to come and put them back together again.

Curtis is gone once she comes back to her senses; he'd run off in a frenzy of embarrassment that she can't help but find adorable. A light smile paves its way onto her face, and she goes after him.

Yancy is twelve when she falls in love for the first time.

* * *

**iii**

She isn't Yancy anymore.

Her manager (and everyone else at _ChitChat_, but they remain off-the-record so as not to discourage her feelings) decides that Yancy sounds too old, too antique for a girl of her alacrity and caliber. So they decide to call her Nancy, as she shot down all of the names offered to her. Nancy was close to her name and felt at home; it reminded her of her mother, when she was on that show on that channel and played that character named Nancy.

She doesn't feel so alone anymore, as all of her fellow colleagues (the classroom days were over) had new names given to them also. Curtis' new name was Christoph, which was strange and rather peculiar. Yancy inadvertently asks why they forgot the -er in his name; their manager simply laughs and pats her head, implicitly reminding her that she still won't fit into the six-inch heels her mother had left her.

She is ten when she starts forgetting.

* * *

**vii**

She is fifteen when she begins piecing herself back together.

At the advisory of her manager (who's basically become her second father, but that's not quite right, because Doctor Rukko was never even her real father in the first place), she reluctantly heads to the Nimbasa Amusement Park. It's too light and too loud and there are too many people there to not notice her (but that's what she asked for, isn't it? A large hat and out of style clothing to conceal her identity?)

Yancy stops in front of the Ferris wheel, staring up at the enormity of it. She remembers a time when she would've been able to ride this Ferris wheel with a companion, but stops herself because that's what broke her in the first place. Unconsciously she toys with the Xtransceiver in her hands, clipping it on and clipping it off with a simple twitch of her fingers.

Yancy is fifteen when she falls in love again.

* * *

**vi**

She is fourteen when she comes to the conclusion that it's okay to look Curtis in the eye again.

"I met a girl today," he says, a dreamy smile on his face. Yancy chuckles softly and effortlessly, inwardly praising herself for overcoming her emotions. Curtis continues to babble on and on about this girl, who is a Trainer named something like Rose or Rosa (she can't remember which). She takes note of a distinctive tone to his voice that means he really likes this girl, and she's glad. Yancy allows herself to be happy for him because she's happy, too, and he's her best friend and she would still do anything for him.

The cameras come on yet again and she flashes a true, genuine smile at the people she can't see.

* * *

**viii**

She is fifteen when she learns how to build walls around other people's hearts.

Yancy watches attentively as Curtis avoids her gaze. There are bags under his eyes and he looks deeply upset; she figures that she's going to have to have a talk with this Rosa girl. He says that Rosa already has someone she likes and that she doesn't want to lead him on, but she still wants to be friends. A threat toward the other girl dies down in Yancy's throat when she realizes that that's what Curtis had done to her. So she allows herself to be selfish in this one instant, letting Curtis have a taste of his own medicine.

Bittersweet, isn't it?

Or perchance it's just bitter. Yancy's grown too old to take her medicine with sugar, and she doesn't ask, just assumes that Curtis has too.

* * *

**ix**

She is fifteen (she's been so forever) when she meets him.

His name is Nate, and Yancy nearly makes the mistake of introducing herself as Nancy. She already loves the way his dark brown hair droops over his visor like a Herdier. She loves the way his smile is constant, and the way his face lights up when she calls (or, she likes to think it lights up). She loves that he always listens, and that he never has bad days.

Yancy likes him so much because he is her complete opposite. She figures out why she and Curtis never worked out: they were too much alike, too unvaried to be together. There had to be some sort of balance in their relationship, but all there was were constant overflows of hidden emotions and sudden influxes of consequential outbursts from their show business careers.

Yancy is still fifteen when a boy breaks her heart for the second time.

(It's getting easier.)

* * *

**x**

She is eighteen when she sees Curtis again.

He's changed over the past three years since _Pokémon Talk with Christoph and Nancy!_ came to an end. Yancy can tell things are going well with him; after all, she's seen him on various television shows and has heard that he's going to be the starring role in a new sitcom. She doesn't feign her glee or attempt to hide it behind a reserved smile as she flings her arms around him in front of the Rondez-View Ferris wheel, unaware of the curious stares and scrutinizing public.

They're ten again.

Her oversized sunhat flies off of her head and his cap falls to the ground, and suddenly they are no longer the boy and girl other people want them to be; they are Curtis and Yancy, because no one knows how to break them down and piece them back together except each other.

* * *

**I have to say, I really am fond of ShiningStarShipping. I think they'd have a Britney Spears/Justin Timberlake-esque relationship, and _ChitChat with Patty Patrat_ is based on the _Mickey Mouse Club_. At least this has a happy ending; I was debating whether or not to make it happy, because famous people are kind of in constant turmoil. I can't imagine the effect and pressure that has on young stars.**


End file.
